Saint Isidore of Pelusium in the Hymnography of the Orthodox Church

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

Saint Isidore, who was Egyptian by birth, was known as the son of noble and God-loving parents, and he was a relative of Theophilos and Cyril, the Bishops of the Church of Alexandria. This venerable man, greatly educated both in divine wisdom and in secular learning, left behind very many writings, worthy of study and remembrance by lovers of learning. Having abandoned every form of wealth, the splendor of his lineage, and the comfort of worldly life, he went to Mount Pelusium and embraced the monastic life. There, living in complete dedication to God, he illumined the whole inhabited world with the teaching of his divine words, with the result that he led sinners to repentance, strengthened those who were struggling in the faith, and stirred to virtue those who were disobedient, through the severity of his divine reproofs. Moreover, he reminded and admonished even kings, for the benefit of the world, and in general interpreted the words of Holy Scripture in a most wise manner for all who questioned him. It is said, indeed, that his letters number as many as ten thousand. Having therefore lived an excellent life and conducted himself according to the will of God, he departed this life in deep old age.

Prologue in Sermons: February 4

 

A Monk Must Not Leave the Monastery in Which He Lives

February 4

(A Discourse on Silence and Humility, and On Not Falling Into Despair)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

Some of the monks, unfortunately, have become accustomed to leaving the monasteries in which they live and moving from place to place. There, they say, the abbot is strict; here, the brethren are quarrelsome; there, the labors are beyond one’s strength; and here, they do not struggle as we would like. And such men run off—partly out of laziness, partly out of pride, partly out of their innate inability to get along—from their own monastery to another, and from that one to a third, and so on. Is this good? 

 

No, it is bad. Bad, first of all, because wandering is forbidden by the Savior Himself, who says: “Do not go from house to house” (Luke 10:7), and “Into whatever town you enter, remain there” (Matt. 10:11). And bad, secondly, because examples sometimes point to the most disastrous consequences for monks who leave the monasteries in which the Lord has ordained them to dwell. For the instruction of such wanderers, we present one such example.

Homily for the Commemoration of Saint Nicholas of Japan (Fr. Daniel Sysoev)

Homily for the Commemoration of Saint Nicholas of Japan 

By Fr. Daniel Sysoev

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit!

I congratulate you all on the feast day of Saint Nicholas of Japan, Equal-to-the-Apostles! This day is special for us, as we want to build a chapel in our large church in honor of Saint Nicholas of Japan, Equal-to-the-Apostles. His life should be an example for us of how a person can fulfill God's will in completely unimaginable circumstances. Saint Nicholas was from the Tver region. He graduated from seminary, then from the St. Petersburg Academy. The Synod sent a letter to the Academy inviting those interested in becoming priests in Japan, and Nicholas agreed to go. Then, after three centuries of banning Europeans from visiting the country, Japan opened its doors to foreigners. Three hundred years earlier, a very successful Catholic mission had been established in Japan, and the government, fearing the mass Christianization of a pagan people, killed all the missionaries and closed the country completely. Ultimately, this policy led Japan to complete economic collapse.

Homily for the Reception of the Lord (Fr. Daniel Sysoev)

Homily for the Reception of the Lord 

 

By Fr. Daniel Sysoev

In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit!

I congratulate you all on the Feast of the Meeting of the Lord! This is the day when we celebrate the meeting of two Covenants: the Old Covenant, made with the people of Israel, and the New Covenant, made with the Universal Church, now including all nations. We must ponder the words of prophecy proclaimed by the ancient elder Symeon, taking the Creator of the Universe in his arms: "Now let Your servant depart in peace, O Master, according to Your word; for my eyes have seen Your salvation, which You have prepared before the face of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of Your people Israel." (By word — according to promise. By revelation — for enlightenment. By Gentiles — the nations.)

This meeting was necessary so that we could understand that the ancient law given to the people of Israel contains something great and important for our day and for the New Testament Church. The entire liturgy of the New Testament Church is woven from the Psalms spoken by the Old Testament patriarch and prophet David. Christianity has a direct relationship to ancient Judaism; indeed, one could put it another way: modern Judaism has absolutely no connection to ancient Judaism, and the direct and sole heir of Old Testament Judaism is the Universal Orthodox Church! Because with it, by the grace of God, the Creator of the Universe, the same covenant was made with ancient Israel. Modern Israel in the flesh has lost this covenant, broken it, rejecting its Messiah, Jesus Christ. The Universal Orthodox Church is the New Israel, having received the blessings that the Lord bestowed upon Old Testament Israel.

Saints Symeon the God-Receiver and Anna the Prophetess in the Hymnography of the Orthodox Church

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

Saint Symeon, whose life was prolonged in this present world because of the oracle he had received from the Holy Spirit — that he would not die before he had seen Christ — received Him in his arms. And after everything that would happen concerning Him was revealed to him by the Holy Spirit and he prophesied these things, according to the oracle that had been given to him he accepted the end of his life. And the prophetess Anna was the daughter of Phanuel, who was from the tribe of Asher. She lived with her husband for seven years, and after she lost him through death, she lived continually in the Temple with fasting and prayer, spending her entire life there. Therefore, because this was her constant way of life, she too was deemed worthy to see the Lord being offered as a man in the Temple, forty days old, by His All-Holy Mother and the righteous Joseph. She glorified God and proclaimed Him with power to all who were in the Temple, saying: "This infant is the Lord who established heaven and earth. This is the Christ, whom all the prophets foretold." Therefore, today we celebrate the memory of these saints, Symeon and Anna, and we proclaim the awesome and ineffable condescension of God toward us.

Saint Perpetua as a Model for our Lives

St. Perpetua of Carthage (Feast Day - February 1)

By Protopresbyter Fr. George Papavarnavas

Saint Perpetua was born in Carthage of Africa toward the end of the 2nd century AD. She came from a noble family and had two brothers. She received an excellent education and made a good marriage. At the age of twenty-two, when she was martyred for Christ, she had a small child whom she was nursing. She was imprisoned because she was a Christian, and while she was in the dungeon-like prison her father visited her and tried, at first with gentle words, to persuade her to deny Christ in order to save her life, so that she might remain with her husband and child. But later, when he saw that she would not deny Christ and remained firm in her faith, he attacked her with savage fury.

While in prison she was baptized together with her fellow prisoners: Saturus, Revocatus, Saturninus, Secundulus, and Eutychia (Felicitas). After her baptism she experienced temptations, but also many blessings. One of these blessings was that two deacons “interceded” with the prison authorities, and when the latter received the money offered to them, they transferred her to a cell with better conditions and allowed her to nurse her child.

Prologue in Sermons: February 3

To the Jurors

February 3

(From the Pandok:* “On Not Showing Partiality Toward People”)

By Archpriest Victor Guryev

To some of you, brethren, the fate of the accused is entrusted, and it depends on you whether to acquit or to condemn this or that person. This duty, in our opinion, is very burdensome. For how is one to condemn the guilty when that guilty person has circumstances that speak in his favor? And how is one to acquit another when nothing good can be expected of him in the future? What is to be done in such cases?

Homily Two for the Reception of the Lord (St. John of Kronstadt)

 

Homily Two for the Reception of the Lord 

By St. John of Kronstadt

“Now let Your servant depart in peace, O Master, according to Your word; for my eyes have seen Your salvation” (Luke 2:29–30).

With these words the holy elder Symeon cried out at the departure of his life, when he took into his arms the forty-day-old Infant, our Lord Jesus Christ, whom, according to the custom of the Law — still preserved among us — the Most Holy Virgin Mary brought into the Temple. With joy he held in his arms Him who holds all creation; with joy the elder Symeon looked upon his approaching end, because in his own arms he saw Him who assured him of safety and of a blessed life even after death.

But we do not envy you, righteous elder! We ourselves possess your happiness — to receive the divine Jesus not only into our arms, but with our lips and hearts, just as you always bore Him in your heart even before seeing Him, while awaiting Him — and not once in a lifetime, nor ten times, but as often as we wish. Who among you, beloved brethren, does not understand that I am speaking of communion in the life-giving Mysteries of the Body and Blood of Christ? Yes, we possess a greater happiness than Saint Symeon; and the righteous elder, one may say, enclosed the Life-giving Jesus in his embrace as a foreshadowing of how believers in Christ in the times to come, on all days until the end of the age, would take Him up and bear Him — not only in their arms, but in their very hearts. Not only in their arms, I say, because the clergy who celebrate the Divine Liturgy also lift Him up in their hands at every liturgy, and afterward — O immeasurable mercy — enclose Him in the embrace of their hearts! O Jesus, Son of God, abyss of goodness and generosity! How do You not consume us, impure in heart and lips, always unworthy of Your most pure and life-giving Mysteries? And yet — what am I saying? You do indeed consume our unworthiness when we do not bring to You, who sit upon the throne, firm and unshakable faith and contrition of heart; but at the same time You immediately give life, grant rest, and gladden us when we are healed of the sickness of doubt and little faith, for You are the Truth and will not allow even the slightest shadow of doubt to remain in us unpunished.

The Reception of the Lord in the Hymnography of the Orthodox Church

 

By Fr. George Dorbarakis

After forty days had passed since the saving Incarnation of the Lord — His birth without a man from the Holy Ever-Virgin Mary — on this most venerable day, His all-pure Mother and the righteous Joseph brought our Lord Jesus Christ into the Temple, according to the custom of the shadowy and lawful letter of the Mosaic Law. At that time the aged and elderly Symeon also came, he who had received a revelation from the Holy Spirit that he would not die before he had seen Christ the Lord. He received Him into his arms, and after giving thanks and confessing God, he cried out: ‘Now You let Your servant depart, O Master, according to Your word;’ that is, now You may take Your servant, O Lord, in peace. And then, filled with joy, he departed from this life, exchanging earthly things for the heavenly and eternal. 

All the hymnography of this great feast of the Lord and of the Theotokos moves within an atmosphere of awe and mystery: “what appears is earthly, but what is understood is heavenly.” The hymns indeed emphasize the historical reality — the coming of the holy family to the Temple when the forty days from the Lord’s Nativity were completed, and His meeting with the elder Symeon — but they also open the eyes of our soul in the Spirit, so that we may see the “depth” of this reality: the astonished stance of the holy angels, who are unable to comprehend what is taking place on earth, as they behold the Creator of man being carried as an infant, the uncontainable and infinite God being confined within the arms of an old man, the indescribable Son and Word of God, consubstantial with the Father, willingly becoming circumscribed as a human being. And the only explanation they can give for these incomprehensible things is the love of God for mankind.